Read Mira in the Present Tense for Free Online Page B

this trip.
    Half of a hundred. I can’t even imagine fifty years.
    Actually, I can’t imagine anything in numbers. I’m rubbish at math. If someone asks me one of those questions like, “If your Nana was born in 1931 and she lived till 2005, how old would she be when she died?” (which, of course they wouldn’t ask), I would know how to work it out, but it would take me so much longer than everyone else. Krish would jump in with an answer way before me. I’d spend ages just staring at the numbers, and when I look at numbers my mind goes blank.
    Nana is seventy-four years old. That sounds really old to me, but she doesn’t feel like an old lady. My math teacher is always nagging me to learn my “number facts.” The problem is I don’t really believe in number facts because Nana is seventy-four years old, but, to me, she’s younger than most of the mums and teachers at school. I don’t mean how they look, I mean…they’re just not as young or as fun as she is: they don’t get excited about things like painting or music or wrapping presents, not like Nana Josie does. Maybe, if you stop getting excited about things, that’s what makes you old. Then, when I think about it, it’s the exact opposite with Laila, because she’s so new, only ten months old, but it seems like she’s been in our family forever. So I don’t think how old you are is really a number fact at all. Nana says she has never felt older than sixteen, but time took no notice of how she felt—it just kept on ticking.
    We park right next to Dusty Bird’s art shop. Nana leans on my arm as Mum and I walk her inside. She wants acrylic water-based paints. Nana says it’s very important to choose the exact colors she has in her mind. I can’t believe how many shades of the same color you can buy. First we go down the white row.
    When you really look, most of the paints aren’t white at all. Nana reads my thoughts.
    â€œIt’s a good lesson in relativity, isn’t it? Something that looks white next to red can look mauve next to another shade of white. Does that make any sense?” she asks.
    I nod. It sort of does.
    â€œIt’s not all white, innit!” That’s Nana’s terrible East End accent.
    â€œLook at this.” She picks up Opaque Titanium White, which is actually bright white, then she pulls out a paint called Lilac Pearl, that makes Titanium White look lilac.
    â€œSee what I mean?” Nana lifts the bottle up to the light.
    I do.
    Next, we walk along the rows of yellows; Nana knows the exact color she’s looking for.
    â€œAh! Yellow Ochre, you’ll get a lot of use out of this one.”
    Nana talks to me as if I’m already an artist, like she knows something about me that I don’t really know myself yet. Dad says it’s natural for grandparents to want their grandchildren to follow in their footsteps. I can understand that, but when Nana Josie talks about art it’s not about what I’m going to be in the future. It’s about what I am now. Sometimes Nana really embarrasses me when she introduces me to her friends, saying things like…“This is my granddaughter, Mira, a fellow artist.”
    We are walking down a corridor of golden colors. The precious golden paint is on the very highest shelf, but Nana’s so small she can’t reach. Dusty Bird, who is as short as Nana, comes over with a ladder. As he climbs up, I can hear his knees creek on every rung. Dusty Bird looks older than Nana, or maybe it’s just that I don’t think of her as being old because I know her.
    â€œWhat kind of gold are you after, Josie?”
    â€œNothing yellowy, nothing sharp or brassy, more of a deep burnt gold, Dusty.”
    â€œYou were always a class act.” Dusty Bird peers under his glasses down the ladder at Nana and winks.
    â€œThanks, Dusty,” Nana giggles, running her fingers